Legal threat to cup ticket touts

THE FA could take legal action against anyone who sold tickets for profit ahead of last week's Cup Final. It has backed a campaign to clamp down on ticket touts in the wake of huge profiteering from the final between Manchester United and Chelsea.

THE FA could take legal action against anyone who sold tickets for profit ahead of last week's Cup Final.

It has backed a campaign to clamp down on ticket touts in the wake of huge profiteering from the final between Manchester United and Chelsea.

Both the Independent Manchester United Supporters Association and The Football Supporters' Federation have urged fans who paid over the odds to provide information to help trace the sources of black market tickets.

Now the FA says it will consider legal action of its own against unauthorised sales. Anyone found to have sold on tickets for a profit will be banned from receiving them again.

The M.E.N. revealed that tickets were being offered at up to 33 times their face value on the internet.

The FA set prices at £35, £60, £80 and £95 - which fans said was already too high - but touts on internet auction site eBay were asking as much as £2,000 for a single ticket.

One Manchester tout was asking at least £1,500 for his two tickets, which cost £60 each, and another local tout was asking £2,000 for two £35 tickets.

The supporters association has posted a note on its website urging fans who paid inflated prices to provide detailed information about their Wembley seats and where they obtained their tickets. A statement by the supporters association says: "There will be no come-back on anyone who bought a ticket from an unofficial source, and your anonymity will be guaranteed.

It is wrong that tickets are allocated to people who don't want them - and even more wrong that they get away with selling them on at inflated prices."

"The profiteers should at least be banned from ever getting Cup tickets again."

It says it will pass information to the FA and demand action against the person or group originally allocated the tickets.

Spokesman Colin Hendrie said there had already been a good response from fans - and they want to hear from more.

But he said: "We feel the FA could do more to use modern technology to clamp down on touting.

"There is no reason why passport-style photographs or other ID cannot be featured on tickets. Cup tickets are produced so early, it shouldn't be a problem."

The Football Supporters Federation says it intends to allow fans who bought `unofficial' tickets to report details on its website.

An FA spokesman said: "We take the issue seriously and we are determined to do something about it.

"If such tickets are found to have originated within the `football family' then we would make sure that whoever sold them on would never receive tickets from us again."